Stealing Back the Stolen
by Jai Lupin
Summary: James and Sirius lost something to Filch, and now they're on a mission to get it back. Cross your fingers so they don't get caught!


Disclaimer: These people don't belong to me...wish they did, but I can't write as well with them as Joanne K. Rowling does. I just own this little Seventh year scene.  
  
Stealing Back the Stolen  
  
James and Sirius put on the invisibility cloak and pulled out their beloved parchment.  
  
"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good," James muttered. The map appeared on the parchment as if it had been waiting for someone to wake it.  
  
"Where is he?" Sirius asked, trying to look over James's shoulder at the map.  
  
"He's up in North Tower for some reason..." James whispered. "We can go to his office and spend about 15 minutes looking through the place even if he left right now. We've got plenty of time."  
  
They hurried to the caretaker's office, muttered, "Alohamora," and entered. The place was spotless. James pulled off the cloak.  
  
"Too clean," Sirius muttered, before knocking over a few papers onto the ground on purpose. "That's better."  
  
James laughed. "You know that he'll think it's us," he said cheerfully.  
  
"Yeah, but he doesn't have proof, does he?"  
  
"And that's what I love about this plan."  
  
They rummaged through everything, every last drawer, but didn't find what they were looking for.  
  
"Where ARE those stupid mirrors?" James asked loudly.  
  
"I dunno...they should be here somewhere. He wouldn't hide them. He'd be too proud of confiscating them to lock them away," Sirius said, trying to keep his voice low.  
  
Just then, James glanced at the map. A small dot labelled "Argus Filch" was moving very fast across the parchment...  
  
"Hurry! Let's go!" James hissed at Sirius.  
  
"Found them!" Sirius said, flourishing two small mirrors.  
  
James threw the invisibility cloak on the pair of them, took the map, and they backed behind the open door.  
  
"Come out, come out! You can't hide from me!" Filch was shouting. He had entered the room.  
  
James was about to retaliate, to say something to scare Filch out of his wits, but Sirius had stepped on his foot. James said, "Ow!" and scared Filch anyway.  
  
"Who's there?" Filch said quickly, glancing towards the open doorway.  
  
Sirius took that as his que, and, using a voice almost exactly like the Bloody Baron's, said, "Peeves!"  
  
Argus jumped, listened for a moment, and rushed out of his off as if he would find Peeves in the maze of a castle.  
  
James pulled Sirius out from behind the door, and together they took off in the opposite of where Filch had gone. Heading towards the fat lady, they glanced at the map to be sure that no one was near them, then whispered a hurried discussion.  
  
"Nice going there, Padfoot. Saved the day, you did."  
  
Sirius grinned, "Well, we got lots done. We destroyed Filch's office, got back our beloved mirrors, and scared the caretaker out of his wits."  
  
"I wonder how he knew we were in his office? He wouldn't have run down there unless he knew someone had broken in..."  
  
"Must've gotten someone who can do magic to put motion-detecting spells in his office."  
  
Sirius frowned, "Bet it was Snape."  
  
"Ha, never thought I'd think Filch would side with a student."  
  
"I bet Snape heard us discussing what we were going to do tonight and he tipped Filch off. And then I bet he agreed to do spellwork for the great git," Sirius said.  
  
They walked in silence until they got to the fat lady. There, James shouted, "DRAGON BLOOD!" before she woke and let them past.  
  
Inside the commonroom were Remus and Peter, who were talking to someone in an armchair, it's back facing them. James wanted to see who it was, but couldn't see over the large, overstuffed furniture.  
  
"Did you get them?" Peter asked anxiously.  
  
"Of course we got them," James said, walking around to see who they were talking to in the armchair. As soon as he reached the other side, he saw Lily Evans sitting, her ankles crossed, her hair on each shoulder, her eyes shining in the firelight.  
  
Remus frowned, "You know you're going to get me in a ton of trouble if you let it slip that I let you do this..." he warned.  
  
"We wouldn't get you in trouble, Remus!" Sirius and James said together as if insulted by the accusation.  
  
Remus laughed.  
  
"So what did you two steal?" Lily asked, interested.  
  
Ever since they started dating, Lily seemed less offended with the marauder's adventures. In fact, she seemed to find tonight's adventure funny. But, of course, Lily never liked Filch.  
  
"The question is, Lily, 'what did we steal BACK,'" James replied.  
  
Sirius pulled the two mirrors out of his robes, where he had been storing them, and gave one to James, who cleaned it off with the sleeve of his robes.  
  
"I don't want any dust from Filch's office on these. They're too important to be infested with the caretaker's muddy fingers..." Sirius said, cleaning his as well.  
  
"Er--did it ever occur to the two of you that we're in our seventh year of magic school and we could simply..." Remus was saying. Instead of finishing his sentence, he got up, took both the mirrors, pointed his wand at them, and muttered, "Cleansus." He handed back the mirrors, which were now spotless.  
  
"Thanks, Moony!" James said, grinning. Then, "Okay, this is what we stole..."  
  
Sirius said to his mirror, "James," and immediatly, everyone looked at James's mirror, which he held up to the room. Sirius's head was in the mirror, grinning at them all...  
  
Sirius turned his mirror to the group of people as well, and they could see their faces all looking back at them through the other mirror.  
  
"That's nice," Lily said, impressed. "What would you use them for, though?"  
  
"Talking to eachother during detentions, mostly," Sirius said in a matter-of-fact way.  
  
"Or when one of us is in the hospital wing faking an illness or cursing ourselves out of class..." James asked, his smile getting wider.  
  
Lily smiled, got up, gave James a kiss on the cheek, and left to her dormitory.  
  
"You know, if I told her this stuff a year ago, she would have turned me in!" James said indignantly.  
  
"Yeah, well you'd better be glad she likes you now, or you'd be using those mirrors in a detention tomorrow night," Remus said, with a smile. 


End file.
